These last few weeks have seen the project take on a life of its own in many ways. All of the paperwork, confusing communication issues, management and day to day planning have more or less fallen into place, which is fantastic, but shifting from 10-12 hour days saw Morgan and I beginning to feel restless here in Icamara. After much puzzlement over where to go in the country (there are so many things to do, but we are now majorly limited in our ability to visit some places due to the recent incidents throughout the country) we decided on Lake Naivasha. Normally, people go to Lake Nakuru, a bigger, better know lake quite close to Lake Navisha, but there was just something about Naivasha that struck Morgan and I as unique. It boasted Mount. Longonot (a once active volcano which is now a national park that you can hike to the top of and then around the perimeter), flamingos, Hell's Gate (the inspiration point for the Lion King illustrations, you know, where Simba is held up for all of the animal kingdom to see), Crater Lake, a religious point of interest to the Masai people, and above all else, hippos. We quickly looked over our travel guides and decided to stay in a place called Fisherman's Camp Lodge. While the books and reviews all said it was a noisy, bizarre hang out place for backpackers and misguided tourists, we felt like we were up for anything, so when we realized the one constant thing in the reviews was that it was renowned for being on the nicest plot on the lake (and after reading one extremely lengthy review online from a girl who had had a religious moment of connection with a hippo on the front lawn of her cabin there) we called up Godfrey, our local taxman, and headed off for a weekend trip.
The car ride was long, but saw us traveling across the Nairobi road (the only really nice road in the country, also affectionately known as Chinese Highway as it was built entirely by Chinese workers/contractors) and though tea land. For a good forty minutes we sat in the car watching endless fields of tea through the car window, I think Morgan really wanted to get out and try to brew some right then and there (she has been fondly nicknamed Tea-girl by Silvia and Pauline) and it was quite breathtaking. If you have never seen tea fields, while they look as through someone has planted tiny hedges in perfectly cut rows for as far as you can see, often climbing and descending sloping hills for miles. Amongst these perfectly cut rows between the tea hedges, there is the occasional worker, bent over, carefully picking branches or leaves and placing them into woven baskets either strung on their hip, head or back. There doesn't seem to be any particular harvest time, it seems to depend on each plant, so workers wander the fields up and down, searching for tea leaves ready to be plucked.
After tea land, we entered part of the extensive national park surrounding Navisha town proper. We were a bit shocked (and confused) to see the sign at the front of the park, listing all of the park's many sponsors, ranging from Verizon, to US Department of Fish and Game, to Safaricom (the local internet/cell phone giant). The park was lovely and it was rather funny to see the signs we normally see warning us of cattle in the road (or moose) replaced with "dangerous animal crossing" signs, depicting big cats, wild dogs, elephants and the like slowly strolling across the road. Finally we were in Navisha town itself, which was in all accounts a rather scummy place. It looked like someone had thought it would be a big tourist attraction, but then given up on it part way through, as almost every building appeared to be only half way completed, often lacking roofs or having second stories sealed up with boards or posters covering unfinished sections of wall. I think so many of the hotels moved out of town to border the lake, that the town itself was an afterthought, or forgotten about all together and now really just serves as a passing through spot. Heading out of Navisha town, we slowly began to see the extent of the tourism the lake supports, watching sign after sign for major hotels and "tented-camps" pass us by as we sped down the outer-city road to Fisherman's Camp. After nearly missing the sign, as our driver Godfrey was once again entirely caught up in a cell phone conversation (Morgan somehow managed to get his attention enough to turn the car around a good few minutes past the sign), we pulled into the camp.
Coming down into the camp itself, we were are at first in awe of the dense tree system encompassing the camp, you barely can even see the few cabins to the left, let alone the house in the middle of it. Upon parking and searching for the head office, we were then struck by the intense beauty of the lake which the trees literally seem to grow into and out of simultaneously. In a manner similar to the everglades, the water seemed to have no real defining edge, and tapered off between trees and low lying shrubs. The other thing which was striking about the lake was the fact that the water was glass calm. Wow, this was going to be a fantastic weekend. After paying our meagre sum for the three night stay, we were given a zebra head key and told to look for a giant banana tree, our cabin was directly behind it.
The cabin was nothing spectacular, but roomy and clean (minus a giant spider that sat watch under the bucket sink without moving the entire stay) and we eagerly dumped out luggage, locked the door and set out to survey the grounds. We crossed the road and headed up towards what is referred to as "top camp" which turned out to be more of a ruin site, clearly the camp had slowed down over the years, or maybe the demand to be directly on the lake outweighed the benefits of keeping the top half open. The "pool" the website had spoke of, was more of a empty roman bath style tub, overlooking the lake from a high. I of course had to climb down into it for a photo op. After assessing the state of top camp, and wandering through the never ending gardens of cactus and overgrown roses, we headed back down to bottom camp for some food and to make our plans for the following day. While we haven't done a lot of off the cuff travel in Kenya yet, we know the country well enough by now to know one thing, don't bother planning too much in advance. Websites, are unreliable, if they've been updated since 2007 or are even close to accurate with price details, consider yourself lucky. Calling places is a bit like talking to an answering machine and expecting a reply. People often say things like "Oh yes, yes" when they have absolutely no idea what you're talking about and often a phone call to one of the numbers listed online, leads to an awkward conservation, when you realize you've somehow dialled someone's home telephone line, have interrupted their dinner, and they only clean at the hotel/camp so have no idea about reservations etc. Needles to say, Morgan and I had simply made a list of possible options for the trip and hoped we'd manage to do half of it upon arrival. We managed to determine at least what we'd do the following day over the course of dinner (a wonderful full-fresh talapia for around 6 dollars US) and settled on Crater Lake and Crescent Island. On the way back to our cabin, we treaded along the electric fence (that comes on full force at 6 pm) with flashlight in hand, carefully hunting for lurking hippos, but were unsuccessful and called it a night.
We awoke at dawn, scrambled to get ourselves together in the dark and made our way over for breakfast, which was in itself yet another example of why not to plan ahead in Kenya. We had been warned to place our orders for food the night before but when we arrived, the people had no clue what we wanted, why we were there, or even what was on their menu. I ended up with some form of pancakes, which after a long conversation managed to come with some form of what they called "maple syrup", a rather honey textured vanilla flavoured oddity, but we ate quickly and soon met up with our guide. We piled into a teeny-tiny jeep, which was covered in stickers as it had just been part of the yearly wheel-barrow race in town and were covered in dust before we had even made it a mile down the road.
One thing about Naivasha town that is unforgettable is the dust, which somehow manages to creep into everything you own, even clothes you didn't wear while there. Every day we were gone we came home so absolutely filthy that regardless of how tired we were, I found myself trying to at least clean my feet in our sink, even though the dust just turned into mud and then dried again, turning back into dust about an hour later. We continued on a road that snakes its way through the entire park/area somehow, even though it is essentially just a strip of sand with other car's tread marks in it. Another side note about Kenya, things you assume on maps are roads, may be just as this road in Naivasha were, dirt heaps, without even an attempt at being levelled out, in other words, what we end up driving on and wondering if we're even on a city road are often the major road for the area. The rule seems to be, if you see other foot prints or car tracks, its the road. We followed this would-be road until we came to the place where we would go on a boat cruise, hunting for hippos and scaring of flocks of flamingos.
We saw a good deal of the flamingos right from the shore while waiting for our boatman and I will admit, it was odd seeing them in a non-domesticated fashion. They were not entirely pink, more pink-tinted. Our boatman finally came out to greet us, saying very little, besides attempting to force us to put on bizarrely shaped life jackets, which we spent a good deal of time lacing up etc. only to get on the boat and then him come over and tell us we could take them off now. I guess the life jackets were more for the dock than the boat ride, as the dock consisted of a few pieces of rotted wood strung together which sunk and wobbled with every step. We set off at a slow place along the side of the lake, making the flamingos run. I should say fly off but I cannot, for it wasn't the case. If you have ever seen a flamingo try to get away from you in water, you will understand what I mean when I say this. They literally flap their wings enough to gain some clearance over the water, then literally run, one foot in front of the other, over the water, slapping their feet on the surface like a marathon runner in slow motion until eventually calling it a day, deciding they've run far enough way from you to make a point, then nose dive back into the water. It got no less strange looking the more we saw it, but this rather interesting and hilarious to view method of running on water we would later realize was a common thing among birds of the lake. A few moments in the ride (we have begun to live on Kenyan time, in reality it had been twenty minutes or so), Morgan and I got worried we'd be out of luck in spotting hippos at all. Everywhere we looked was silent. Dead silent, once we had cleared the flamingos, and we exchanged looks of concern. Where the heck were the hippos? Then all at once, the boat came to a stand still and a few meters in front of us to our right, was a giant bloat(pack) of hippos.
Tustling about in the water, grunting and huffing and splashing, jarring their mouths open to 180 degree angles, there they were. Finally, the all allusive member of the big five we had yet to see was right in front of us and then all at once gone, dipping down and disappearing beneath the water's surface. Luckily, they are easy to track, as they leave giant air bubble trails above where they're running under water but our boatman knew better than to follow them so we jetted off, spending only a few moments in travel before coming to our next family, and then another family, and another. The lake was literally chalk full of hippos and we were in heaven. Just to add to it, on the shorelines giraffes began to emerge along with their babies, warthogs, gazelle, impala and all sorts of other wildlife that is becoming almost normal to us at this point. Becoming normal however does not make it any less amazing to see these creatures I've yearned for so long to be amongst , it just makes you realize that living in this country has spoiled you forever to conventional safari. Especially on this trip, Morgan and I had so many close encounters with these magnificent animals, that Sweet Waters almost seems like a distant memory, kind of a prelude of what was to come for us.
After the boat trip, we headed deeper into Crater Lake Nature Sanctuary, where we were able to get out of the car at the gate and walk through it, coming within metres at times of giraffes, zebra, gazelle, impala, warthogs, different sorts of monkeys, baboons and even buffalo (although when we saw the buffalo we kind of had to high-tail it to the other side of the field, they can be aggressive and the front gate warns "enter at your own risk" with accompanying skulls for a reason).
After touring the sanctuary for a good few hours, we made the quick track up to the viewing point for the lake, an iridescent green water body cut perfectly in a circle from the surrounding hills. From the view point you could also see both parts of Lake Naivasha, so i the crater lake appeared like a dot of water in the middle of a larger circle of water. Crater Lake is extremely alkaline, so the Masai tribes people have used it for centuries to cure bloat and other ailments of cattle. They do so by literally nearly drowning the cattle in the lake, forcing the air bubbles trapped in the rumen etc. of the cow to be brought up in belches.
A pretty neat spot, but we were all to aware of time, and quickly headed back down the crater to our Jeep to make it back to the camp for our boat ride to Crescent Island.
Crescent Island is a rather bizarre place to visit. Being the outer rim of a once massive volcano, it sits just meagrely connected to land, long and thin, steep and narrow, and houses an extensive and dense population of wildlife. Getting to the island is itself a journey, about an hour on a narrow gondola like boat which weaves its way along the edge of the lake, hoping to find hippos and other wildlife housed in the swamps around the lake perimeter. Our boatsman was intent on showing us how the Fish Eagle hunts (the local celebrity of birds) and stopped in one of these grotto style swamps to pick up some fish from local fishermen who were using walking-nets to fish (meaning they both hold a side of the net spread out in the water up to their chests and then walk towards each other, drawing in the net and trapping everything within the bounds of the net. They quickly brought up a dozen or so fish, of which we took four or five, thanked them and took off.
We passed endless colonies of birds, some of which we spotted as seagulls, only to be corrected in the fact that they were "yellow billed ducks". We think the gulls of Canada would like this kind consideration in their naming but had to laugh at how our boatsman seemed to be boasting of their beauty and gracefulness on the water, all we saw was squawking, screaming seagulls, who like the flamingos, preferred running on the water to flying away as the boat approached them. After awhile we stopped the boat in some weeds and our boatsman learned over and some of them pulled out and into the boat, taking the straw like weeds and literally shoving them down the throats of our fish. He explained this made them float on the surface of the water, which we didn't understand the need for, until we saw what he was planning for his demonstration of the Fish Eagle hunting.
He took a stuffed fish in one hand and in the other, began to make a whistling noise with his hand over his mouth, waving the fish in the air. He did this for some time, then like clock-work a Fish Eagle appeared and began to circle our boat. He then tossed the fish into the water, which the eagle was supposed to gracefully swoop down and scoop up, but this took quite a few tries and a different eagle (the first one we attracted didn't seem to want to take the bait). Sure enough, the second eagle that came to check out what we were offering took our meal and like a movie scene circled us, descended with amazing speed, swept up the fish and just as quickly as it had come, left. We continued on with greater speed across the lake, nearing Crescent Island.
We made an abrupt landing, in a dense meshwork of weeds and water irises and were greeted by one of the park's four rangers, who had to help haul our boat closer to the dock, or at least close enough so we could disembark. When I put my feet on solid ground it felt like we were entering Jurassic Park. The island seemed totally barren and yet here were wilder beast, zebra, giraffe and all sorts of other variable wildlife calmly transversing right in front of us, as though we weren't even there. I literally got so close to a zebra that I almost got kicked.
Part of the epic Out of Africa was filmed on Crescent Island, which seems fitting, given the bizarre oasis it is. As the sun began to set on us, the animals we were amongst became even more beautiful and strange, as everywhere you looked someone was watching you, be it a giraffe from behind a tree, a hartebeest from the ridge, or one of the many oddly interspersed sheep with black-faced white as snow babies in tow, you really got the feeling this was their place and we were visitors who were welcome, but still a source of some curiosity.
It was totally new to us to be both seeing and being seen, usually we're the ones looking at these animals, not the other way around. This unique experience was one not easily forgotten and we left the island as the sun began to fade wishing we had more time. We rushed straight across the middle of the lake back to camp as it began to spit down rain and made it back just in time for dark. The next day was one we had already settled plans for, climbing Mount. Longonot, so we called it an early night, made ourselves cozy in the very quite cabin and quickly fell asleep.
Dawn comes quicker when you're on the equator and less hard to sleep through when you're surrounded by birdlife. All sorts of never before heard sounds awoke us and soon we were packed and ready for the hike. We got a taxi (that is one truly and still confusing aspect of Kenya, the utter lack of public transportation, even to tourist driven areas and national parks) to the base of the park and after once again attempting to get a student rate (always a very confusing and rather frustrating adventure, which has never yet ended with success) we began to head up the steep, dusty and slippery hill to the rim of Longonot, and within an hour of truly difficult and strenuous climbing (we were both winded more than once at the sheer continuous incline) we made it to the rim.
From here, we followed what looked like water carved trails along the perimeter of the volcano, a three to four hour trek. I say trek, because to say it was simply walking, would be foolish. To say it was climbing would also be unjust. Even to say it was hiking would be untrue of the situation, for really the journey around the rim is a mixture of all of these methods of movement, in addition to sliding, crab-walking, side-winding and at times, closing your eyes and praying to God you are strong enough to boost yourself up or down a drop off with purely your arms pushing against walls of rock on both sides of you.
It was a completely unique type of exercise and each leg of the journey was in some way different from the last, but the one thing which was constant was the sense that if you veered off the path, you'd be screwed either side you feel on. On one side, was the volcano. Steeply dropping off straight into buffalo ridden forest. On the other side, was prickly and thorny looking shrubbery, which deceived you from the steepness of its drop-off by covering it for as far as you could see. All around us we would see depressions from other craters or erupted volcanos, which now were only visible as darker coloured sections of forest in somewhat circles.
The weather was also hard to pinpoint for description. One second you'd be sweating and panting in the intense heat and humidity and then the next you'd be shivering from the strong hard wind hitting you from all sides. Finally we made it to the absolute peak of Longonot, stopping long enough to converse with some fellow travellers (I swear everyone we meet is on some sort of foreign aid mission/project) and continued the perimeter trek, finding ourselves back to our starting point within an hour or so and then quickly descended to the base, at times running out of necessity (it is impossible sometimes to stop or slow down when you're near tumbling down a crumbing dirt hill at a 60-75 degree incline). Coming down we once again made notice of the strange way people view exercise or any form of physical activity here. Locals were hiking in full on three piece suits, others were carrying babies on their backs, all things which made no sense to us, but do make sense with what we've seen of how people here view what we'd consider a good workout. While we look at the chance to hike as a good way to get out and do some work, expect to sweat a bit, get dirty and maybe even require something to drink, people here seem unwilling to admit to these kind of inherent risks are present when attempting something like hiking, and instead act as thought they're going for a stroll, stopping to take a break every few minutes. Footwear choices for these kind of activities, and well any type of activity at all, range from flip flops, men's dress shoes or high heel pumps straight from the 90's (chunky and uncomfortable looking), so no one really intends on running anywhere, or even getting anywhere at a fast pace. People simply take each step as it comes and think us insane for wanting to challenge ourselves or get our hearts racing. So as we saw people heading up the mountain in these outfits, we had to laugh at ourselves in shorts and tank tops, hiking shoes on foot. They probably got a kick out of us as much we did of them, another thing which seems to be a given in almost any situation here in Kenya. Passing by people and having them laugh out load at you is oddly something you slowly become used to, yet I am even now in awe of the man carrying a baby on his back up a mountain/volcano. Especially given how many times Morgan and I flat out fell on our rear-ends, all I can imagine is losing your footing and crushing the child, but I've seen stranger things since being here, so I have to assume it is commonplace.
We finally made it to the bottom and attempted (barely) to de-mud before getting in the taxi and heading back to camp. I still don't think I got even half the dust off me after showering but it was of no consequence, for we were heading to Hell's Gate the next morning and already knew it would be dusty as, well, hell. Our last night in the camp really gave truth to the reviews that had declared Fisherman's Camp a noisy venue. Locals arrived from Nairobi at around 5 pm and set up about a dozen tents on the other side of the banana tree from us, parked a beat up looking car in the middle of the tents, and began to blast any type of music you can imagine. At 2:45 am, when I was still awake listening to this great party, I finally began to see the need for the camp's literally dozens of signs posting about noise restrictions and the local by-law regarding noise violations. Obviously these signs mean little regardless of their wide presence in the camp and the party continued until somewhere around 5 am, at which point it stopped only long enough for who knows what to occur, and promptly began again at 7 am.
At dawn we entered Hell's Gate park and immediately decided our plans of biking the 8 km trail to the legendary gorge were a bust. Again we saw ourselves on a sand road and after seeing bike wheels sink into the thick dust, with their ridders struggling to push forward, and cars pushing bikes off the road into the even dustier ditches, leaving riders enraged and in the end with no other option but to walk with their bikes, we figured we'd be better off to walk it.
As the sun came up behind us, it filled the park bouncing off the red-wall cliffs surrounding us and began to illuminate the wildlife emerging from the cliffs into the plains to graze. The usuals surrounded us within minutes and we quietly and contentedly walked the 8km to the gorge where we got our mandatory guide and set out, or rather down, into the once-filled, sometimes even now filled, waterway. Throughout the gorge there were oddly hung ropes leading to the top, which we later found out were emergency exits, for when the gorge notoriously floods. Not only is this a common occurrence, but several North Americans and Kenyans recently lost their lives in this manner, so we tried to remember where had seen the last exit ropes as we climbed through the riverbed.
Hell's Gate is actually named so for these floods and the toll they take on human and animal life, dating back to Masai times, when the gorge flooded so frequently with water, boiling water from the many hot springs which run into the gorge, or even in some cases lava (you can use lava plugs as landmarks to negotiate your way through the gorge). On one end of the park is The Devil's Bedroom, a place where cannibals were thought to have lived, being the only individuals brave or insane enough to take up permanent residence in the gorge. Snaking our way through the gorge we saw hot springs of various forms. Some sulphur filled and boiling hot (there was a spot you could actually boil eggs in and shells lay strewn all over the rock face) while others were merely warm. Morgan contemplated whether it'd be a better shower experience than our one at the camp for at least the water would be warm the whole way through.
Traveling through the gorge involved a lot of fancy footwork, getting totally soaked more than once and a good deal of faith in our guide, but we managed to do it in a little over and hour before heading back the way we'd headed in, only with much less animal life around us. Out of the park we headed back to camp, packed our things and as usual, found ourselves waiting for Godfrey, who called us at the time he was supposed to be there to tell us "I am thinking that maybe I am coming here now," one of the many phrases which were at first a source of confusion to us but are now so commonplace we don't even answer it with a question, only an "Ok Godfrey, see you when you get here".
The weekend was a fantastic one and held many unexpected pleasantries, chiefly our interactions with wildlife. Being so close to these animals has really prepped us for Masai Mara at the end of July and we only have a few more animals to cross off our must see list, primarily big cats. We certainly cannot expect to find any better way of viewing wildlife than exactly how we did it this weekend, one on one, so everything from here on in must be considered one of the many life altering perks of living abroad and add to the love we are developing for Kenya itself and its inhabitants. Lake Naivasha was all and more than we had hoped for, now we have only to hope our other trips will be equally as awesome.
That's all for now, enjoy the pictures and look for another posting soon!
Jen
